


Untitled Future-Fic Angst Project

by epkitty



Category: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Angst, Death, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Out of Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-29
Updated: 2012-01-29
Packaged: 2017-10-30 07:03:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/329063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epkitty/pseuds/epkitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a depressing What If story, something of an experiment that I wrote not long after I got into the CSI fandom. (Whether the experiment is successful or not is up to you.)</p><p>What if Greg and Grissom gave it a go? What if... something happened?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untitled Future-Fic Angst Project

The general hustle and bustle of clearly organized chaos slipped through the glass halls and bubbled out of the pristine rooms of the Las Vegas Crime Lab.

Greg Sanders walked with his purposeful gait, some specific destination in mind, with the ever-present clipboard tucked beneath his arm, chatting into the tiny phone embedded in his glasses. “No. No, I did not say ‘please,’ I said ‘now.’” He angrily tapped the button near his ear.

“Hard day at the office already and you’ve only just got here. Clara piss you off or Whistemir riding your ass?” A petite Asian woman in a smart blue pantsuit walked beside him, palm pilot in one hand, folders in another. She handed the latter to him, which he took. Not expecting an answer, she added, “These are fresh off the presses from Sanchie.”

“Miss Sanchez still trying to make up for the snafu last week?” Greg muttered, opening the first file to scan through it, letting Umi Ito part the sea of the hall, as it were.

The pretty little woman scowled at him, though he never saw it. “She’s a hard worker, Greg, a very hard worker. We all make mistakes, as you well know.”

“Constant mistakes are—”

“ ‘—the hallmark of a failing CSI,’” she parroted. “You haven’t yet let us forget it.”

“Just make sure she stays on track,” he murmured. This was the only approval he would give for the perfect test results in his hands.

Umi smiled at him. “Oh no. That’s your job. Boss.”

= = = = =

“Assignments,” Greg growled, sorting through the cards in his hands.

Jervase and Delia shared a look that expressed how eager they were to get as far from Sanders as possible.

Greg glared at them, reading their faces with ease. “Fine. You two together. Three DBs off Rte. 19—”

“Again? Aw, c’mon man,” Jervase whined, taking the card. “Where at?”

“Little Stop’N’Go gas place. I don’t care for your attitude, Stimpson.” He switched his gaze to the redheaded Delia. “Patrolman who found the bodies will meet you there. All right, move off.”

The CSIs exchanged raised brows and left without a word.

“Bartlett.”

The bespectacled, lanky man -- who would never be able to correct the fact that he bore a distinct resemblance to D&D geek -- jumped about a mile. “Y-yeah, Boss?”

“You and Umi will be with me down at the MGM. Two men dead. Resembles a mob hit. Clara Baretti is meeting us there. Let’s roll.”

= = = = =

“Da, da, da,” Charlie Sanchez was singing to herself, bobbing her head. “Night fever, night fever… da-da-da da da-daaaa…” She swung around on her chair to grab an evidence bag and was faced with a dark figure in her doorway. “Ah!” She ripped off her headphones and took a deep breath. “Can I help you?” She stood, but no taller than five foot three.

The woman in the doorway stepped in and glanced around the lab. A visitor’s badge swung from her lapel and her brown eyes took in everything. “I don’t think so. I was just looking for Greg Sanders… but I hear he’s out.” She looked the lab tech in the eye. “Sorry; forgot my manners. I’m—”

“Sidle? Sara Sidle?” Sanchie squeaked, spying the name printed on the badge. “The same Sara Sidle who developed that new print-lifting reagent?”

“The very same.” Her grin was charming as she held out her hand.  
 Sanchie shook it enthusiastically. “Oh my gosh!!! This is so cool; I always wanted to meet you! I wanted to hear you speak at San Diego, but there was this thing, and I couldn’t, and I was so disappointed; I can’t believe you’re here! Do you know Sanders? Oh my gosh; Sara Sidle is in my lab this is crazy is there anything I can do?”

“Can I have my hand back?”

“ _OH!_ Oh dear, I’m so sorry. Of course. I just-- I’m so excited!”

“I could tell.” Sara regarded the star-struck lab tech with a quizzical smile. When Charlie Sanchez said nothing, Sara asked, “Why don’t you show me what you’re working on?”

Eager as any scientist to show off her experiments, Sanchie fairly jumped with excitement and swung around to the equipment. “All right, this: this is the coolest…” She held up a stained shirt and for the next ten minutes was nothing but a babble of technical jargon.

= = = = =

“Sanchie, I thought you’d be in the… lab…” Delia Lambert stopped in her tracks, her pageboy hair swinging forward in a red haze. “Am I interrupting something?”

Sanchie and her guest were wearing blue sterile suits complete with little blue booties, white sweatshirts, goggles, and blue hairnets. They were both holding baseball bats, and covered in blood spatter.

“Sorry Miss Lambert! We were just…” her brown eyes sung over to Sara Sidle, pleading.

“Experimenting!” she said. She laid aside the bat and took off latex gloves after her goggles and hairnet, shaking out dark hair streaked with gray. “Hi,” she said, walking forward, only a little sheepish. “I’m Sara Sidle, a friend of Greg’s.”

“Greg who?” Delia demanded, not accepting the hand that was offered her.

Sara was initially thrown by the question, but gave her most charming grin and answered, “Greg Sanders.”

Delia’s response was “Humph.” And she turned to Sanchie. “You, my dear, are supposed to be in the lab. And if you aren’t there when Sanders gets in, your ass will be nailed to the wall.”

Sanchie’s valiant bubble of excitement popped with a puppy-dog frown. She began racing to get out of her protective clothing, almost forgetting the evidence of the sweatshirt, which Sara carefully helped to remove. “I take it you’ve got something for me?”

“A three-for,” Delia agreed, eyeing Sara with a rather hostile gaze before ignoring her completely. “Semen, blood, saliva.”

“Great!” Sanchie enthused, skipping after the CSI out the door.

Sara stood alone in the garage, still wearing her blood-spattered sweatshirt and looking at the open doorway. “Tight ship,” she observed.

= = = = =

“Excuse me, do you have clearance for this room?”

Sara looked up from the computer to see an attractive young man with very black skin and no visible hair in the doorway of the AV lab. She fingered her visitor’s badge and smiled. “Sure. I’m just killing time, helping with cases, till Greg gets in.”

Jervase looked as though he’d just heard a foreign language. “I’m sorry… What are your credentials?”

Sara pointed again to her visitor’s badge. “I’m Sara Sidle. I have—”

Though Delia had failed to recognize the name, Jervase obviously did not. He broke in, saying, “You’re the foremost criminal investigations forensic chemist in the nation.”

She smiled, somewhat shy. “That’s what they tell me. And you are?”

“Jervase Stimpson. CSI, level three.”

Sara nodded and then indicated the case box in his hands. “What have you got there?”

Jervase set the box down on a counter and began removing transparencies and laying them out on the light table, which Sara flicked on. “A drive-by, at first appearance, although evidence now clearly suggests otherwise. Still, casings go on for a mile. These are satellite shots of the path. Stop’N’Go up on Route Nineteen.”

“Stop’N’Go,” Sara wondered out loud. “Really…?” She realized she was being watched. “What is it?”

“It’s just,” Jervase stumbled with his words as he continued lining up the transparencies. “I knew you used to work here, but I didn’t know you knew Sanders.”

She nodded, slowly, starting to understand.

“I mean,” and he laughed to shake off the discomfort, “no one calls him Greg and gets away with it. Except Umi and the Davids. Did you work with him for long?” he pressed, uncertain how far he could go.

Sara was not put off by the question. She smiled and helped align the map that was slowly taking shape. “We worked here at the same time for nine years. Six of those, we were CSIs together. You know, he started out as a DNA tech?”

“Yeah; yeah, everyone knows that,” Jervase lightly informed her. “So, you both worked with that entomologist fella?”

Sara’s smile cracked. “Yeah. We did.”

= = = = =

Doctor Geraldine Swicks looked up at the knock on the morgue door. She saw an unfamiliar face in the little square window and with a bloody glove, gestured a welcome.

Sara pushed open the door. “Hi! Doctor Swicks, I don’t mean to disturb you, but I’m an old friend of Greg’s. Just visiting. I have a couple questions from Jervase about the trio of DB’s from up on Route Nineteen.”  
 Doctor Swicks raised a cynical brow and said, “All right. But you have me at a disadvantage…?”

“Sara Sidle,” said the older woman, tired of introducing herself, but not showing it.

“Ah,” said Dr. Swicks, seeming to find this a good thing. She looked away from Sara for the first time, and down to the female body before her. “Yes. I’ve heard of you.” Her intent was unclear, but her green eyes, magnified by futuristic-looking goggles, seemed amused. “You said you have questions, Miss Sidle?”

“Yeah,” Sara agreed, glad to get to work. She raised the clipboard in her hand and began. “So, which one do we have here?”

= = = = =

A lanky man with frizzy brown hair and a fidgeting leg sat at a computer terminal at CODIS.

Sara poked her head in the door. “Excuse me.”

He jumped about a mile. “Oh! Oh, you scared me!” He clutched his heart and peered at her through thick-lensed glasses.

She smiled.

He swooned.

“Ah,” she looked down and to the side, asking, “Just looking for Greg. Do you know if he’s back yet?”

“Greg? Y-you mean Greg Sanders?”

“That’s the one,” she affirmed, nodding, pressing amused lips together into a line.

Paul Bartlett took off his glasses and swiped at his brow with a shirtsleeve. “Yeah. Yeah, he’s here somewhere. Don’t know where.”

“Okay,” she said. “Thanks. I’ll try his office.”

= = = = =

Grissom’s old office looked different when Sara peered in the window. The blinds were vertical – Venetian – reminding her of a prison cell. The room inside was full of sturdy shelves, most of which held carefully labeled boxes or reference books. The desk was metal instead of wood and in a different place, pushed up to one side instead of along the back.

The plyboard fish was still screwed to the wall. There were papers and pictures tacked there. Some of them were familiar. But the room was otherwise empty.

= = = = =

She stuck her head into DNA. “Sanchie!” she shouted, just loud enough to be heard over headphones.

The lab tech pulled off her music and turned to smile at her. “Yeah?”

“Seen Greg?”

The usual response first, the girl went blank for a minute. “Oh, _Sanders_! Yeah; you just missed him by about three minutes. Can’t have got far.”

“Thanks.”

= = = = =

After going through what felt like every lab and corner of the place, Sara finally tracked him down in the garage where the blood spatter experiment was still set up. With him were Paul Bartlett, Umi Ito, and Clara Baretti, the last of which looking exactly the part of a tough cop in a movie of questionable plausibility.

The two sweatshirts hung on dummy torsos and Greg was thoughtfully examining them.

Jervase and Delia walked in behind her before Sara could make her presence known.

Greg looked up at the sound of the bickering CSIs to see Sara standing between him and his underlings. “Sara.” His voice was flat, his look accusatory. “I hear you’ve been leading my staff astray.”

She feigned affronted defense. “Astray? Me?” She gestured at the mannequins. “I was just helping.”

He growled.

She smiled.

“Stimpson. Lambert. What is it?”

Sara resigned herself to being ignored until the end of shift.

= = = = =

“Your CSIs hate you,” Sara said over her chipped coffee mug.

“They do not hate me,” Greg told her flatly, staring at his plate of too much greasy food.

Sara regarded him with a sharp stare, leaving no room for escape. “I know you want to be a good supervisor, Greg, but… using fear and this Vulcan non-emotion? That’s not the way to do it.”

“I’m gruff and crotchety. I’m not mean.”

“I beg to differ,” she said, using all the utter truths she knew without a single coat of sugar. “I hear that you reduce Charlie Sanchez to tears at least once a week.”

Greg looked up at her. “Remember what’s her name? During my first solo proficiency? She didn’t even last a day. Miss Sanchez has been here for two years. She’s solid. She can take it.”

“Take it? What, like a man? Greg. This is Not Cool. ‘Mr. and Miss This and That.’ You’ve spent twenty years pushing away everyone around you. That’s long enough. You’ve got to let it go.”

He glared at her, pushing his eggs through the tongs of his fork. “Why are you here?”

Her answer was so quiet as to be nearly unheard. “You know why.”

Greg’s eyes turned stormy, angry. He looked out the diner’s smudged windows. “What are you thinking, Sara? That I’m gonna do something stupid? That I shouldn’t be left alone?”

“No,” she calmly told him, drinking coffee that looked like an oil slick. “I thought… I shouldn’t be left alone.”

Clearly surprised, and with nothing to say, Greg ate his breakfast-dinner and kept his stormy eyes down.

= = = = =

“Miss Sanchez.”

Sanchie looked up from her locker, smiled at her boss and her idol. “Yeah?”

“I’ve brought Miss Sidle onto our team for a week as a reagent and forensics expert. You’ll be working with her when she’s not needed in the field.”

“Excellent!!” Sanchie squeaked, clapping her hands together with a staccato echo that reverberated harshly in the locker room.

= = = = =

It had been nearly twenty minutes. Sanchie could hold out no longer. “Sara, can I ask you a personal question?”

They were in the middle of processing, and were mostly waiting for results. Strict attention was not required, so Sara shrugged and tucked graying hair behind an ear. “Sure.”

“What was Sanders like, when you worked with him?”

Sara’s smile pulled itself through a subtle transformation. It was an expression that mingled longing, bitterness, regret, and fondness. “That was a long time ago,” she murmured, looking through the fishbowl of their surroundings. But no one was nearby to overhear. She took on a wicked look then, something akin to a twinkle in dark eyes. “You won’t believe me.”

Sanchie looked startled. “Of course I will; why would you say that?”

Sara smiled, silent for an extended moment. “You remind me a lot of Greg Sanders when he was your age.”

Sanchie’s jaw dropped. “I don’t believe you.”

Nodding, with an ever-widening smile, Sara continued, “Greg Sanders was an up-and-coming expert in his field, who enjoyed surfing, coin-collecting, expensive coffee, punk rock, and stashing semi-pornographic magazines in the break room.”

Gob-smacked, Sanchie could say nothing.

Sara went on, “He flirted with just about everyone, including me; he wore converse sneakers and these obnoxious, convulsion-inducing shirts in the lab. His hair looked like he’d stuck his finger in a socket, and he failed his first proficiency.”

Sanchie was leaning forward like a child toward a storyteller. Her tone was awful. “You’re not kidding, are you?”

Sara shook her head, and again checked the halls, but they were still alone. 

“What happened?” Sanchie wanted to know.

“I can’t tell you that.” Sara was cool, calm. Sad.

“But you know?”

“I do.”

= = = = =

There was a riot of laughter in the break room.

“And so he was walking around the lab for eight hours in these little blue booties…” Sara cracked up, covering her laughter with a bony hand. “And he was limping, and went storming into Grissom’s office; I’d never seen him so angry at anything!”

“What was it?”

“What happened?”

“What did he do?” they all wanted to know.

“Well,” Sara said, meeting each of their amused gazes in succession, “Grissom had laced one of his feet with mildew!” She had to fight over the outpour of laughter to continue: “And he had this rash you wouldn’t believe-- for the next two weeks!”

Greg Sanders stood in the doorway, eying them all dispassionately.

One by one, they noticed his appearance, and sobered quickly.

Delia and Umi swallowed their laughter and the first looked away while the second raised a smirking brow. Umi got away with the sort of things other people didn’t when it came to Greg Sanders.

Jervase turned aside to hide his continuing laughter while Paul blanched and visibly shrunk into the nearest corner.

Sanchie and another lab tech sunk, side by side, further into their chairs.

Sara pinched her lips together and looked at Greg, dark eyes twinkling.

Finally, Greg decided to speak. “Sara. You’re undoing all my hard work. Now, how am I going to intimidate my subordinates?”

For a brilliant moment, there was silence. Then Umi suggested, “I don’t know. But I wouldn’t recommend a gold lamé headdress.”

Nervous laughter bubbled through the room. Greg could only shake his head and leave them to it.

= = = = =

After her second day disrupting Greg’s staff, Sara sat in his living room. They shared tea, with some undistinguishable music in the background. 

Greg appeared forlorn and haggard, far more vulnerable than he ever did at work. “Sara.” His words were difficult to come by, and she gave him the time he needed. “I’m glad you’re here.”

She nodded and pretended to smile, but he wasn’t looking, and it hurt to smile. She closed brown eyes and frowned at nothing. “I’m glad I’m here,” she offered; a tear slipped down her cheek. 

Absorbed in his own grief, Greg did not notice. He slowly turned his cup about on its saucer. “We have different ways of doing things. I know you’re on a good program in L.A. … but I think you should consider coming back.”

“Back to Vegas?” she asked, surprised. She shook her head, mouth open and speechless until she forced out, “I couldn’t. I, uh, I couldn’t. It’s… I don’t know how you…”

“Yeah,” Greg sipped his tea. “That’s what everyone else said, too.”

“I’m sorry,” Sara broke in, truth and pain in her voice. “I shouldn’t have left the way I did. Left you.”

Greg shrugged. “You did what you had to do. For yourself. We all did.”

“We all left you,” she corrected in a sort of denial. “In our own way. Do you still… Do you keep in touch…”

“I visit Doc Robbins. Every other Thursday. For brunch.”

She smiled her false smile. “That’s nice.”

“I see Nick sometimes.” He drank more tea. “Not very often.”

Sara nodded dumbly, seeking a balance between kindness and truth. It was too difficult. “Yeah. Yeah, Catherine and I are still keeping in touch. We talk on the phone every month.”

“That’s good,” Greg said.

She nodded. “Yeah. Yeah; did you know Lindsay is having another kid? Did I tell you that?”

He shook his head.

“No? Well, they say it’s another boy. She’s disappointed.”

Greg made no response and their conversation died out.

He finished his tea and ate a biscuit. He stood and disappeared down the hallway for a minute before returning with a box. It was a fancy box, about the size of a shoebox, the sort you could get in craft stores for videos and photos.

“I didn’t want you to come,” he told her. “But I expected it. I got… There’s a few things… I thought you might like this.” He set the box on the table.

Hesitantly, she took off the lid. Inside was a collection of memorabilia. She first looked through a stack of old photos, tears flowing down her face.

Warrick, an arm slung over Nick’s shoulder. Both laughing. Beers in hand. Overexposed.

Greg, two party hats on his head, like devil’s horns. Making a funny face.

Doc Robbins and Catherine, reluctantly posing.

Nick and Sara hugging.

Grissom close-up, perplexed and slightly offended. 

Hodges, unamused.

David and Doc Robbins toasting.

Brass, making a peace sign.

Brass, making a far more offensive sign.

Sophia blushing.

A sign that read “Congratulations Greg” tacked above the bar.

Mia with Greg in headlock.

Greg sneaking up on Hodges.

Grissom and Catherine, smiling bemusedly.

Brass with an arm over Sophia’s shoulder. Both glaring at the camera.

Nick, Warrick, and Greg squeezed into the frame, laughing.

Greg kissing Sara on the cheek.

Greg kissing Catherine on the cheek.

Catherine pushing Greg away and making a face.

Greg giving Catherine bunny ears.

Five lab techs in a Conga line.

Warrick making an impressive pass under the limbo stick.

Sara making an unimpressive pass under the limbo stick.

A table full of empty glasses, pitchers, and bottles.

Hodges with straws up his nose, surprised by the camera.

Warrick and Nick arm-wrestling.

Nick attempting to work a handheld video camera. Very confused.

Greg attempting a handstand. Failing.

Greg with an arm around Grissom.

Putting down the pictures, Sara took a moment to recollect herself. “That was such a great night…” she tried to say without choking.

“Yeah,” Greg agreed. “Yeah.”

In the box was a little notebook. Greg had taped things in it: old news clippings of an amusing nature, political cartoons of the time, a few postcards, even fortune cookie fortunes. This was easier to look at.

There were other things in the box. A few random Polaroids. A battered copy of National Audubon Society North American Insect and Spider Guide. A framed photo of Sara and Greg in the field, covered in grease and dirt, but smiling. An old convention ID tag with Grissom’s name on it, labeling him as a ‘Keynote Speaker.’ Sara caressed this and marveled over it for many moments.

A poker chip. An evidence bag with a tube of lipstick in it. Sara blushed, remembering a particular incident from the past. “I can’t believe you kept that,” she said, almost laughing. A wristwatch. At the bottom, an unmarked compact disc. She picked it up, curious. “What’s this?”

Greg held out his hand and she gave it over. He stood to put it in the DVD player. After a few moments, the color clicked into focus and sound dribbled out the speakers.

Sara watched the screen avidly.

She saw feet and floorboards. Warrick saying, “Give it up, man! Give that thing to me!”

“I got it! I got it under control!” That was Nick’s voice.

The camera panned wildly until she saw Warrick holding a beer and looking straight out of the TV. A camera flash momentarily illuminated him from the side. He shook his head. “Don’t point that thing at me, dude! Man of the Hour’s over there.” He pointed.

The camera swung wildly again and a group of distant people faded into darkness out of focus. Handheld and with crazy jolts, the cameraman walked forward. Nick narrated. “Here we are at Woodhouse’s on Greg’s Big Day! Let’s see if we can find him.”

Mia walked in front of the camera and stopped to look. She slowly came into focus. “Nick, you look ridiculous; what are you doing with that thing?”

Nick, offended but not angry, said, “Making a record! Greg’s gonna want this someday!”

“What for?” Hodges asked, coming up beside Mia. “To show at his surf conventions?”

They moved on and Nick walked forward again, sounding apologetic. “Sorry about that. Leeeeet’s seeeeee….” The bar and its familiar patrons came on screen. Nick walked down the line of them and got slightly better results. People waved and said things like, “Hey! Look at me; I’m finally a star!” and “Congratulations, Greggo!” and “Hey Nicky, you better stay away from Brass; he hates those things.”

At the end of the bar, he unsteadily stopped and quickly zoomed in and out on Catherine’s face, as though ogling her. “Nicky. What on earth are you doing?” She sounded so much like a mother. 

Nick laughed. “Say something nice about Greg, Cath!”

“He’s a fantastic CSI. And an extraordinary dancer.” She pointed off screen.

The camera panned over, passed a gyrating figure, and then back to it. Greg was on the dance floor, making a complete ass out of himself. A small crowd of CSIs and lab techs were jokingly cheering him on. Someone pulled out a camera-phone to take a picture. Greg spun in a circle, arms flailing. He saw the camera and danced over. “I’m ready for my close-up, Mr. Stokes! Finally, I’m recognized for the renaissance soul that I am, and fabulous dancing!” He was noticeably drunk. He danced in what would have been a suggestive manner if not for the goofy grin and jerky motions. “Ha ha! Top of the world, Ma!”

“You look great, Greg,” Nick shouted over the music. Greg danced away and pulled a girl onto the dance floor with him.

Nick turned the camera and continued on, toward the tables. A figure passed by and the camera went fuzzy for a moment until Sara, twenty years younger, came on screen. “Nick, if you know what’s good for you, you will get that thing out of my face,” she said matter-of-factly and walked away.

“Well,” Nick harrumphed, “That’s what I get for my generosity.” He walked forward toward an area set aside for tables. Finally he came to a table with Brass, Grissom, Doc Robbins, and David. David blushed, stood, and walked away.

Nick’s voice: “Hey guys, how’re you doing?”

Doc raised his glass and saluted. “Why, we’re just fine, Nicky. Nice camera. New?”

“Borrowed it. Hey, say something nice about Greg!”

“Well, now it’s official,” Doc Robbins said, “He’s allowed to boss me around, too!”

“That’s not very nice!” Nick teased, switching over to focus on Brass. “What about you, Jim?”

“Oh, yeah, real great,” he huffed belligerently. “Now he’ll think he can do anything.”

Ignoring this, Nick turned the camcorder on Grissom. “Hey Griss! I’m sure you have something poignant to add.”

“Nick? Put the camera down.”

The camera lowered, focusing on Nick’s feet. “Yes, boss.” He sounded very cowed.

The tape went on for another ten minutes.

Greg and Sara watched in silence broken only by the occasional bark of surprised laughter.

= = = = =

Greg waited until Sara had gone. A long time after. Noon -- the equivalent of his midnight -- threatened by the time he moved, shakily gaining his feet, digging out a DVD hidden in a dictionary on a high shelf.

Again, he watched the events of the night unfold, but where Sara’s version faded to black with a rousing chorus of ‘For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow,’ his continued. He watched his younger self, not as drunk as he acted, climb up onto the pool table, call for everyone’s attention to a few good-hearted cheers of “Speech! Speech!”

He waved down the hecklers and sloshed beer over those who stood too close. “Sorry! Sorry… Yes, the unthinkable has happened… CSI LEVEL THREE!!!” he shouted to whooping cheers and applause. “And since you’ve had so much faith in me, I’ve decided it’s time to get a few things off my chest.” Worried mutters. “First of all, I’m a very insecure person.” Much laughter, the stupid, drunken sort. “Yes, and to that end, I’ve felt it necessary to keep a few secrets over the years.” Cat-calling and jibes from the crowd. “You don’t believe me? The first one’s a real shocker, I’ll have you know!”

“What’s that, Greg?”

“He’s actually from Mars!”

“Ha ha,” Greg laughed dryly. “No, but you’re close. I’m gay.”

A few laughs petered out into confused whispers overridden by the thump of club music. The camera shuddered and slid to the side before whipping around and back to Greg, elevated by the table. Nick’s voice came over, “…what?”

Greg nodded his head, “Yup; it’s true.”

Sara’s voice from somewhere around the pool table, sounding slightly disappointed, “But, I thought you had a crush on me?”

This broke the tension, and suddenly everyone was laughing again.

“Actually,” Greg responded, “I think I had a crush on your hair.” He jumped off the table and moments later weaved through the masses to appear before the camera, smiling widely. “Dude, are you getting this?”

Nick’s voice: “Yeah, ‘dude,’ are you really gay?”

“C’mon Nick; I know you’re from Texas but how long have you known me? I’m camper than a row of pink tents. Now, follow me; it’s time to end the night! Either you’re about to get footage worthy of the World’s Most Amazing Videos, or evidence in the case of my murder. Let’s go!”

The camera followed Greg through the crowd, over to the nearest table, where Grissom and Robbins still sat together. The Doc got a funny look on his face, pushed himself to his feet. “Quite a speech,” he said, clapping Greg on the shoulder. “Now I really need a drink.”

Laughter from off-screen.

Nick moved to the side, to capture Greg and Grissom regarding one another.

“Well, Greg? Are you expecting something from me?”

Greg laughed and rubbed a hand over his short, spiky hair. “I thought maybe you’d have a quote or Grissomism for me.”

Grissom pushed away his beer and thoughtfully shook his head. “No.”

“Well that’s okay,” said Greg. “I have something else to say; I didn’t think you’d appreciate me telling everyone up top the billiard table.”

“What’s that, Greg?”

“I love you.”

There was silence in the immediate vicinity of the camera, the ambient noise of the bar filtering through until Nick’s low whistle broke the silence.

“And I don’t expect a thing,” Greg persisted, desperation in his tones. “But this is my night, and I was wondering… can I kiss you?”

Grissom looked off-camera to someone out of range, then to Nick through the lens, and up to Greg. “Tell Nicky to put that camera away and I’ll consider.”

“Nick! Camera down!”

“Hell no! This is hysterical!”

Grissom’s hand reached out, pushed the camcorder to one side; cat-calls and whistles resounded feedback over the cheap speaker of the recorder. The screen swung, zigzag, back up to Greg and Grissom, the former smiling in a daze, the latter with a bit of a smirk. “All right Nick, that’s enough.”

“But I missed it!”

More laughter until the video abruptly cut out and Greg stared at a blank screen.

= = = = =

“Hey, uh, M-Miss Sidle?”

Sara looked up from the ‘scope. “Paul.” She smiled at the geeky CSI. “Call me Sara,” she reminded him. “What is it?”

“Uh,” Paul fiddled with his glasses, repositioning them on his nose. “Uh, it’s Thursday, and we all go out to breakfast at this place down the street. We were hoping you would join us after work.”

“Yeah, sounds great!”

= = = = =

Sara slid in beside Sanchie, filling up the circular corner booth. “No Greg?” she asked.

Umi put down her coffee and shared a glance with the butch Delia. “No Greg,” the petite woman answered. “He doesn’t really do ‘social’ you know?”

“Tell me about it,” said Clara Baretti, the Homicide Detective. “I went to a forensics convention with him in Long Beach: as soon as his question/answer was over, I swear he Disapperated, right off the podium.”

“You’ve been reading Harry Potter again,” Paul accused.

“So what if I have? But I didn’t think he could move like that anymore. I mean ‘bam!’ gone without a trace. I didn’t see him again till the next morning in the coffee house down the street. He was wearing sunglasses, had his collar pulled up. Still, some young techs spotted him; they wanted his autograph!”

“Those poor kids,” Sanchie said with feeling. “What did he do?”

“Mostly he growled,” Clara said. “I figured I’d be nice: called him ‘Sweetie’ and said we were gonna miss the Spatter, Spray, and Cast-Off Session if he didn’t move his ass.”

Everyone laughed.

“I bet he made you pay for it later,” Jervase huffed.

“Yeah…” but she didn’t elaborate.

“Reminds me of a convention I went to with Greg and Gil Grissom, way back when.”

“Oh?”

“How’s that?”

“It was right in Vegas,” Sara began as their food arrived. “Grissom was doing his usual Maggot/Time of Death thing, and Greg was floating paper airplanes to the rest of us in the back row. After all, we’d heard it a hundred times before. I think he was trying to distract the impenetrable Boss. But all he got was a glare and threat of suspension.”

Sanchie giggled, most everyone else was tongue-tied.

“Oh that’s nothing,” Sara went on, expecting the response. “One Christmas…”

= = = = =

Sanchie and Sara were the last ones left. Everyone else had begged off, saying it was getting too close to their bedtimes. Sanchie was still downing hot chocolates and Sara seemed reluctant to leave. “This is the same place we used to come in the old days,” she observed, thick with nostalgia. She looked out the window and smiled, gesturing to a car in the lot. “One time, me and Greg were maxxed out on overtime, so we couldn’t take the Tahoes back to the lab. We filled Nick’s truck up with _all_ the evidence, and one of the suspects towed his truck right out of this parking lot! Oh, it was so bad.”

“He didn’t just take everything back to the lab first? Wow.”

“You’re telling me. It was tough. Weird, too. There was this wedding: mother of the bride was tied to the bumper of the ‘just married’ car, dragged out right in front of the guests.”

“Holy crap.”

“Yeah.” Then she laughed, quick and free. “Because we lost all the evidence, we had to make an account of everything we did, in order. So, Greg, Nick, and I sat down, talked it out. Greg,” she laughed again, “sounded like a film noir voice-over! Oh, we tried not to laugh.”

Sanchie was smiling thoughtfully. Silence lay between them then, until she finally spoke up with, “So really. Can you tell me what happened? Why he changed?”

Sara looked out the window, frowning. She shook her head, throwing the graying hair from before her face. It seemed as though she hadn’t heard the question. “Twenty years ago, Greg Sanders finally became a CSI level III. We had a huge party, down at Woodhouse’s. It was amazing.” She ran a hand through her hair. “At the end of the night, Greg launched himself on top of a table, made this huge announcement to the whole crowd… Came out.”

“He came out!?”

“He came out,” Sara nodded. “I was shocked. …All that time flirting with me and Catherine… And he just did it. After I don’t know how many years of… well, if not lying then at least misleading us. And, I didn’t actually see this, but I know it happened: he got down off the table, went over to Grissom… said he loved him.”

“No way!”

“Way.” Sara nodded. She still looked out the window. “Yeah… They kissed right there in front of everyone.” She laughed. “The surf geek and the bug guy.” She stirred her cold coffee, watched the dark swirl of it. “Twenty years ago yesterday… was the anniversary of Gil Grissom’s murder.” Sara finally looked Sanchie in the eye. “They had a week together.”

Sanchie was devastated. “Oh, my god…”

“Within a year, the team fell apart. I went back to L.A. Catherine went into forensic education. Nick moved back to Texas. Warrick – and at the time, it seemed like half the lab – applied to work days, even swing. Greg stayed in nights. Eight years later he was the youngest supervisor in the history of the Vegas crime lab. For twelve years, he’s been leading the fight to keep the city safe, deliver the evidence, produce the best CSIs in the country. But that murder; it changed Greg. It changed him like I haven’t seen… You know, it’s clichéd to say, ‘what’s-his-name died and a part of so-and-so died with him…’ But it’s true. A part of Greg died. I think it was as much Greg’s alarming change in nature as Grissom’s death that scared the rest of us off. He was so quiet, in a sort of fierce way.”

“Still is,” Sanchie whispered, hesitant of interrupting.

Quiet again, Sara nodded and watched life go by outside the diner’s window.

= = = = =

The End


End file.
